Powerpoints printed as worksheetsStill true. However, I originally wrote this question when I had the convenience of “free” (that is, entirely covered by my private school tuition) printing, and I don’t have that anymore. I also prefer to print the slides to take notes when they’re posted before the class, and I’ve only had one professor at Iowa State who’s done that.

Gay rights!
Good lord, this is embarrassing. I was Jennifer Lawrence before Jennifer Lawrence was Jennifer Lawrence (and I’m older than her, so I can say that). To be clear, I’m not reacting this way because I don’t still enjoy “gay rights,” but that phrasing is so, so painfully shallow.

Apples to ApplesMy first experience with Apples to Apples was actually more about my reluctance to play Apples to Apples when I was hospitalized for mental health issues. Every night on the ward, some group of people would be playing Apples to goddamn Apples and even though I knew it was an open-invitation thing I was still too worried about being rejected to join in. Then I learned it’s actually much more fun to play with people you know, and that’s why it ended up on this list.

PsychologyEvery so often I think about what having a college degree in something means. Purportedly you’ve devoted a significant amount of studying to it, have developed relationships with people in the field, and you could conceivably be considered an expert in it. I don’t really feel like this. My grad school letters of recommendation were written by professors in the rehab & counseling education department (one of my two “second concentrations”) and while I feel like I have an understanding of scientific study design, basic psychological principles, and maybe a few tidbits I can regurgitate to impress people at parties, it still baffles me that I possess a piece of paper recognizing my efforts in psychology.

Professors that are 100% badassI know exactly which professor I had on my mind when I added this item, and he wasn’t “badass” in the sense that most people probably use the word. He was a sort of understated, acquired taste-type badass. Sometimes – he never made it a “thing” – he’d have a YouTube video of a Joy Division song or something, and it was clear he was just showing it to us because he wanted to listen to some Joy Division. He was a history professor, and his lectures consisted of him standing in front of the class and talking about whatever was next on the syllabus, no PowerPoint or anything. It was hard to tell if he planned what he was going to talk about, because he was clearly so knowledgeable about history that it felt like he was just casually telling us about each topic. And I learned a lot! I almost added a history minor because of the classes I took with him. He also let me take a midterm late because my depression kept me from coming in on the scheduled exam date, which was nice of him.

Apple crispI made apple crisp for the first time ever about a year ago. It’s still one of my favorite things in the world.

Sneaking outside food into movie theatersI didn’t do this at all until high school. When my friends and I would see a movie, we’d generally eat at the Mary’s Pizza Shack across the street, then walk to the gas station next to the theater and buy bags and bags of $1 candy, then unassumingly walk into the theater with our bounty. I doubt that theater would let us get away with that now.

Harry PotterIf I were to really go into this, it would warrant a post of its own. I have a story for every book, a story for every movie, and even some Stern Thoughts about how disappointing Pottermore ended up being for all the hype it got. It’s genius, it’s problematic, and it would absolutely be on my “100 happy things” list today.

iChat emoticons :)I grew up a Mac user, and even after upgrading to OS X, I’d use the regular AIM client instead of iChat. I think I may have preferred the authenticity that came with seeing people’s screen names and custom fonts, as opposed to iChat’s first name/last name buddy lists and customizable-only-insofar-as-other-Apple-users fonts and colors. But when I first got my own Macbook Pro before starting college, it was iChat all the way. And I guess the emoticons were just strange enough to be cool, or something deep-sounding like that.

Finishing a really long bookI’m awful at remembering book titles and even plots unless they really stuck with me, so I can’t remember what book(s) I might have been talking about here. I assume either something by Italo Calvino or maybe W. Somerset Maugham’s Of Human Bondage, which I may have finished by the time I wrote my original list. Or maybe I was just thinking of a 500-page young adult novel that wasn’t great so much as it was long. That is a satisfying feeling, though, especially when you close a hardcover book and it makes that satisfying thunk.

Reading outside in the sunWhen did I ever do this? I know for a fact I stopped going outside as soon as I discovered the Internet.

Hugging people who smell nice
I was thinking of a specific person when I wrote this. We don’t talk anymore.

PokémonMy 2007 high school music department trip to Anaheim was all Pokémon, all the time. Pearl and Diamond had just come out for DS, and I was the only person who had Pearl, so everyone else with Diamond wanted to trade version-specific Pokémon with me to complete our Pokédexes, and the person I alluded to in #33 helped me beat the game that weekend, and, and, and.

Finding old photos of myself I don’t remember takingI have Photobucket accounts filled with hundreds photos dating back to 2004, so this happens quite a bit whenever I remember my old passwords and feel like logging into them. And because I’d be an awful, unkind person if I didn’t share at least one, here you go (it’s probably from around the time I wrote the original “100 things” list – note the Rockstar can collection in the background):

The way I make my lowercase “F”sHere’s a good example from my original, handwritten list. I just enjoy how clean they look. (And yes, I do dot my “I”s now.)

Alan ZweibelI started watching the Late Show with David Letterman every night when I was a junior or senior in high school (but only during the summers – I was asleep by 9:30 on school nights). Alan Zweibel was on one night talking about his novel, The Other Shulman, which ended up being quite good. Here’s the video from his appearance:

Teen lit that’s actually quality literatureToday, there are a bevy of articles with a title similar to (or exactly) “In Defense of Reading Young Adult Fiction.” I’m not going to link to any of them, but just know they’re there. I think my view on this has changed quite a bit since I wrote this in 2010, because I think I was trying to “cover up” (in a sense) my love of YA when I didn’t really need to. Some “regular” literature is great and some is terrible, and the same is true of YA. I still read a ton of YA, and some of it is great, and some of it is terrible. But it’s not inherently worse because it’s YA. That’s all.

My nostalgia drawerI know of two different drawers this could be, and thinking of either of them is not stirring any nostalgia. Sad!

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2020 General ElectionNovember 3rd, 2020

19months to go.

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